


all these dancing steps (brought me to you)

by mouseymightymarvellous



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Breakfast dates, Doctor!Sakura, F/M, Parties and Dancing, Sakura Haruno Server 6 Month Anniversary Exchange, Wingman!Itachi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 21:29:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29107104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mouseymightymarvellous/pseuds/mouseymightymarvellous
Summary: Sakura has attended the Annual Uchiha Midwinter Gala for the last sixteen years. Mikoto is not going to let her miss this year because of something as silly an excuse as "work". How else will Sakura fall madly in love with an Uchiha and finally marry into Mikoto's family? She's such a lovely girl, Mikoto cannot believe there isn't a single man in her family with the wits to snap her up.Shisui endeavours to be a dutiful nephew and loves the colour green.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Uchiha Shisui
Comments: 47
Kudos: 243





	all these dancing steps (brought me to you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Olol](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Olol/gifts).



> I haven't written much ShiSaku, so I hope this is an acceptable entry to the ship. Congrats to the server for reaching the 6 month milestone!

“I know,” Sakura says, phone barely caught between her ear and her shoulder as she tries to open the wrapper on her granola bar, “I’m really sorry, I tried to get the time off but we’ve two doctors out sick with that flu that’s going around and another had to unexpectedly go on bed rest, yeah, no, she’s fine and the baby’s fine, but it means we’re understaffed. And, shi--”

Shizune manages to catch Sakura’s phone as it slips from its precarious position, saving it from yet another crack along the screen.

She really should invest in some headphones with a speaker so that she can stop dropping her phone while trying to talk and open stubborn food products simultaneously. 

Shizune rolls her eyes as Sakura shoves the granola bar into her mouth and takes the phone back with a rudely muffled “Fanks.”

She swallows hastily and catches the insistent voice starting to panic on the other end of the line.

“Sorry, Mikoto. I dropped the phone. No, yes, I’m fine. It just slipped. Yeah, I’m picking up some extra shifts in the ER and I’m the apparently the only person without-- No, aw, Mikoto, you know I’m rightfully terrified of disappointing you, but you’ve met my boss and she won’t accept that I’m more terrified of you than of her, and I’m married to my job, not Sasuke, so she has more claim on being my mother-in-law. No. Yes. I know I’m a Uchiha by proxy but you don’t actually have blood tie claims on me, and, no, thank you for offering again but my mother and father will be very disappointed if I let you adopt me out from under them when I’m only now finally a real doctor.”

“What shift?” Shizune asks between bites of curry.

“Yes. No. I-- Uh-uh.” Sakura startles and pulls the phone away from her ear for a moment. “What? Oh, um, Friday.”

“That yearly thing you go to? Where you always wear stupid shoes and then bitch for the next three weeks about your feet hurting?”

Sakura blinks. “Do I?” She puts the phone back to her cheek for a second. “Hold on Mikoto, I think Shizune is offering to be your new favourite not-daughter. Hey, Shizune, are you offering, as my kind and generous senpai, to take my Friday night ER shift? You hate Friday overnight shifts. Everyone hates Friday overnight shifts.”

“You’ll owe me six,” Shizune says. “Genma keeps bitching about me not being available for Friday night date nights and the hate sex is getting boring.”

Sakura makes a face. Extortion, that’s what this is. “Gross. Yeah, Mikoto, Shizune is willing to make me a terrible deal, but because I love and fear you-- Yes, yes. Of course I’m taking it. No. I’ll be there but you’re not paying for new shoes. Do I know--? It’s been at the same place starting at the same time for longer than I’ve been alive, yes, I’ll be there on time. I know-- I know-- No, I’m not taking responsibility for Naruto or Sasuke, they’re responsible for each other now. Yes. Okay. See you then. Bye.”

Exhausted, Sakura tosses her phone onto the shitty table in the break room and drops her face down into her arms.

“This is why I’m never getting married,” Shizune opines.

Sakura throws a spoon at her.

It’s unfair, really, how Shizune can make a plastic spoon bouncing off of her forehead look dignified.

.

.

.

“You know you have a key, right?” Ino asks as she finally opens her front door.

Sakura gives the doorbell one last push. “This is more effective for conveying the drama of my predicament, though,” she says, shouldering rudely past Ino into the apartment, kicking off her shoes and making her way to the living room to collapse dramatically onto Ino’s most comfortable and hideous couch. “Anyways, I still haven’t recovered from the last time I walked in on you getting eaten out on your kitchen countertop.”

Ino puts her hands on her hips and stares down her nose at Sakura’s piteous sprawl. Sakura shifts so that her bangs fall even more pathetically into her face and pulls out her most effective pout.

“Now you’ll know better than to question my flexibility,” Ino declares.

Sakura nods in rueful agreement; she’ll never call Ino out on her claims involving the benefits of her over-priced yoga classes ever again. Sakura is a doctor and she didn’t know that you could bend your legs that way.

“Why are you here being pathetic on my couch?” Ino asks. “You’re not dating anyone, and you know I’ll make fun of you if the problems you bring upon yourself aren’t related to your frankly cursed relationship choices. And I promised not to try to make you cry for three whole months.”

“You know how I feel about sad animal commercials!” Sakura says with an accusatory finger pointing up in sudden righteous anger at odds with the rest of her slumped body posture. “I can’t believe you would send that to me when you knew I was waiting for Sasuke and Naruto to meet me! I had to endure an entire sixteen days of Naruto following me around trying to apologize. Again! It’s been four years!”

Ino sniffs self-righteously, but Sakura can tell she’s resisting the urge to cross her arms defensively.

She knows she was in the wrong.

Ino can’t bluff Sakura.

Well. At least not when they’re in the same room.

Sakura really should stop clicking links and getting surprised when the all-too familiar notes of “Never gonna give you up” start to play.

“You’re still not forgiven! So the least you can do to make it up to me is lend me a dress.”

Ino glares suspiciously at Sakura and then laughs. “Move over,” she orders, and shoves Sakura’s legs out of the way so that she can sit next to her on the couch. “You let Sasuke’s mom get to you again, didn’t you? What deal did you have to cut to get out of that shift once you made the mistake of picking up her call?”

“Ino,” Sakura whines, “what if it had been an emergency?”

Ino pokes her in the side. “If it was an emergency then Itachi would have called you, idiot. You’re just a sucker and you know it. So. Cough it up, what deal did you make.”

Sakura makes a face, and Ino pokes her again, this time in the kidney. “Ow!” Sakura yelps. “I cannot believe I work hard all day, saving lives, and I have to come home to this abuse.”

“You don’t live here,” Ino says, and pokes her again, but softer this time. “C’mon Forehead, what dumb bargain did you make once you got guilted into going?”

“Six,” Sakura mutters.

“What was that?”

“Six Friday shifts, okay! I know!” She puts her arm over her face so that she doesn’t have to see the judgement in Ino’s eyes. “But I go every year! And they have really nice champagne and those little crab things! And Mikoto was really sad that I wouldn’t make it; you know she still feels guilty.”

“She’s not your mother-in-law,” Ino reminds her.

“I know! And she’s so sad about it!”

“You should have dated Itachi instead,” Ino declares sagely. “He would have married you properly and not broken up with you to date your other best friend.”

“Well, yeah,” Sakura says, “because Itachi and Naruto have nothing in common besides loving Sasuke. Why would they have ever dated?”

“I don’t know. Most of the time you can’t tell, because he’s an idiot, but Naruto has a kind of deep rooted peacefulness with the universe that could really complement Itachi’s whole… deal.

“Huh.” Sakura squints from behind the refuge of her arm. “I hate that that makes a bit of sense.”

“Anyways,” Ino says, “focus. Dresses.”

“You started it. Ow!”

“I’m glad you recognized that, after the fiasco of that blue thing you wore three years ago that you aren’t allowed to pick out formal wear without me.”

Sakura sits upright to glare. “You ditched me when we were supposed to go shopping! I still cannot believe you let me go shopping while emotionally compromised so that you could go on a date with Chouji.”

“If I hadn’t ditched you, I wouldn’t be engaged!”

“If you hadn’t ditched me, I wouldn’t have had to survive an entire conversation with Sasuke’s creepy uncle about how I was handling his ‘terrible betrayal’ while he stared down my dress! And Chouji’s been in love with you since we were fourteen. He would have understood you rescheduling on him so that you could help your very best friend pick out a revenge dress to wear to her ex-boyfriend’s giant influential family’s annual midwinter gala!”

“I mean, to be fair to creepy uncle Madra, you do have cute tits,” Ino allows.

“Thanks. That means a lot coming from you.”

“It’s true,” Ino says, “I’m not so insecure that I can’t appreciate another woman’s tits. I’m secure in my appeal.”

“You know that I’ve always admired that about you,” Sakura tells her.

“I know. And my ability to pick a dress. Stay here, I’ll grab a few things from my closet.”

“I love you!” Sakura shouts at Ino’s retreating back. “Also, do you have any shoes that won’t make me cry when I have to spend the entire next day on my feet?”

.

.

.

“Sakura,” Itachi greets her with a respectful handshake and an understated warmth in his eyes. “You look lovely. Mother will be so happy to see you, she was quite disheartened when it looked like you weren’t going to be able to make it.”

Sakura’s known Itachi for almost two decades now, and it’s the only reason she can pick up the mischief in his voice.

“I’m sure you had nothing to do with the guilt call, and in fact attempted to talk your mother out of it,” she says, pursing her lips around her own smile, not nearly as practiced in the sly restraint that is Itachi’s trademark.

“Nonsense!” Shisui swings an arm over Itachi’s shoulders, all wide grin and impossible curls. “Of course we told Auntie that she should phone you up and talk you out of your self-sacrificial nonsense. What would the Uchiha Midwinter Gala be without your shining presence, beautiful?”

Sakura rolls her eyes and then makes meaningful eye contact with Itachi who is not remotely ruffled to have his cousin hanging over him and, if he weren’t Itachi Uchiha and rather a lesser man, wrinkling the immaculate cut of his tux. It’s unfair, truly, that they both have only grown to be even more gorgeous in perfectly fitted black tie over the years. Luckily, after almost two decades, Sakura is something that she can almost trick herself is immune to the Uchiha genes.

“Indeed,” Itachi says, the traitor, “all the Uchiha would regret your absence you had been unable to attend. Especially Great-Uncle Madara.”

Shisui’s grin sharpens and Sakura splutters for a moment before steeling herself.

“I should marry him,” she snaps, “it would be the least you two deserve.”

Shisui slips off of Itachi and catches her hand, thumb to the pulse in her wrist. “Oh, but then we’d have to call you Great-Auntie and you wouldn’t get to join us at the kids’ table any longer.” He presses a kiss to her knuckles. “And what would be the point of coming to these things if we couldn’t admire you across the dinner table?”

Sakura tugs her hand away and resists smoothing her palms against the front of her dress. She trusts Ino’s tastes without question (when it comes to clothing), but she’s suddenly self-conscious of the sleek green fit and the cutouts framing her ribs.

Shisui has teased her since she was thirteen and awkward with it, always with a gallant seriousness that she’s never been sure if she can trust. She chooses to be reassured that the tempestuous drama of four years ago has never changed the way he charms her, in concert with how Itachi has always let her in on his jokes since the first time he caught his humour under his serious mask.

She sniffs, putting on as much haughtiness as she can manage. “Don’t let Mikoto hear you say that or she’ll think you don’t appreciate her catering enough.”

Shisui opens his mouth to say something wicked, but Mikoto herself bustles over.

“Sakura! Sweetheart, you made it! And look at you. You look beautiful.” She pulls Sakura into a soft hug, smelling of the same delicate perfume that she’s worn everyday for as long as Sakura has known her.

Sakura lets herself sink into the hug for a moment.

“I especially love the decorations this year,” she tells Mikoto. “You’ve outdone yourself, as always.”

Mikoto laughs and presses a quick hand to Sakura’s cheek. “You are always so polite. Now, you’ve done your duty of greeting me. If you want to say hello to Fugaku, he’s holding court in the Blue Ballroom, and I’m sure he’ll love to see you. He mentioned last week that he wanted your opinion on a new grant program the Foundation is working on, for providing better access to medical care in rural communities. But if you don’t want to talk business tonight, we’ll have you over for lunch in a couple weeks. And Sasuke and Naruto still haven’t arrived, but those boys have never been punctual without you taking them by the ears, so I don’t know when they’re planning on showing up. Have a lovely evening and don’t even think about enlisting yourself to help cleanup, that’s what the very well paid staff is for. You’re just to enjoy yourself.”

With that breathless speech, Mikoto hugs her again, butterfly soft, before pressing kisses to Itachi and Shisui’s cheeks and bustling off to greet more guests.

“You heard the woman,” Shisui declares, “we’re to show you a good time. Itachi, go get the lady a drink while I convince her to dance with me.”

“I don’t dance,” Sakura tells him. “Especially in these shoes.”

“Nonsense,” Shisui declares, his hand warm and steady at the small of her back, fingertips just shy of catching on the bare skin of her ribs, as he guides her forward towards the open dancefloor. “Of course you have to dance when you’re wearing that dress, or else how are the rest of the guests supposed to admire your beauty? Anyways, I was around when Auntie enrolled you lot in those ballroom dancing classes, I know full well that you can dance and that the problem was that Naruto could never stop bouncing enough to avoid stepping on your toes.”

“You tried to make Sasuke salsa with you,” Sakura remembers with a smile.

“He was never very good about giving up the lead,” Shisui mourns.

“He never was a very good lead,” Sakura says, only a little bit mean.

Shisui shoots her an appreciative smile. “I love it when you’re mean,” he sighs.

“Don’t worry,” Sakura tells him as he pulls her into his arms, their elbows at perfect angles, their hands clasped comfortably, “I’m very happy being mean to you.”

“Sakura!” Shisui gasps as the music starts up. “No dirty talking on the dance floor!”

Sakura goes to answer, but Shisui sweeps her into a quick set of steps, and soon she’s too busy laughing.

.

.

.

It’s much too late, and Sakura has at some point lost her terrible shoes.

Luckily, it’s the point in the evening where most of the remaining party guests are too drunk to notice her bare feet. Unluckily, Sakura works in ten hours and she is definitely not drunk, and so she can’t blame the lost shoes on drunk decision making.

They’ve lost the last of the various Uchiha cousins and dates who make up, as Shisui calls it, “the kids table” (even though they’re all young professionals now and not actually relegated to the set of rooms set aside for all attendees under drinking age) to either the dance floor where couples are slow dancing or to the various hotel rooms rented out for guests who are either from out of town or too drunk to make their way home. 

Shisui digs his thumb into the ball of her left foot, and Sakura bites back the moan that tries to crawl its way out from her rib cage.

“Every year you wear these shoes,” Shisui tells her with the kind of seriousness that only drunks can manage, “and every year your feet hurt. Why don’t you buy new fancy shoes? I would buy you new fancy shoes, Sakura.”

Sakura shrugs and does her best to not collapse in her chair.

Shisui’s hands are broad and warm and precise, and Sakura can’t quite handle the knowledge of what they feel like wrapped around her ankles to pull her feet into his lap.

“I only wear them once a year, so when I get home from the gala I throw them in the back of my closet in disgust, and by the time the next year comes around I’ve forgotten again, until I’ve been wearing them for two hours.”

“I would say women’s clothing is stupid, but you look so good in it, so it isn’t all bad,” Shisui tells her.

He’s very earnest, curls bouncing in his eyes.

Sakura determinedly doesn’t think about what his hair would feel like if she were to run her fingers through them. Sakura has been determinedly not thinking about what Shisui’s hair feels like for most of ten years, so it’s mostly rote practice by now.

“Don’t worry, Shisui, I promise to do my best to get the time off next year. You don’t have to sweet talk me into it, I think that goes above and beyond your duties to your aunt.” Sakura pulls her feet out of his lap, slipping easily out of his suddenly slack grasp. “I’ve had fun spending tonight with you, but you don’t have to feel obligated next year. I’m sure you didn’t particularly want to waste your time babysitting me. It’s been years now, and I am more than over the whole,” she makes a vague gesture with her hands, trying to encompass the mess that was her and Sasuke, “thing. It was sweet, though, so thank you.”

Sakura stands and smooths her dress down.

Shisui is staring up at her, something shocked to the soft part of his mouth.

Sakura leans down and presses a kiss to his forehead. “I’ll find Itachi on my way out and make sure he sees you get into a bed. Again, thanks.”

Shisui’s hands are very warm on her hips, and his thighs are firm when he pulls her down, Sakura so taken aback that she tumbles easily into his lap.

“You think this is because, what, I pity you?” he demands.

His brow is drawn, and Sakura kind of wants to smooth the furrows out with her thumb. She also kind of wants to cry, and she’s not really sure why.

“You’re my friend,” Shisui says. “And, well. I thought it was obvious. I haven’t exactly been subtle about things the last couple years, Sakura.”

Sakura blinks.

His face is very close.

“You’re drunk,” she reminds him.

“Sure, but I’m not stupid.”

Sakura tries to stand. He’s drunk. She shouldn’t let this go on.

She’s not really sure how she’s going to explain to Ino how she ends up sitting on a cloth covered hotel banquet table with Shisui Uchiha between her legs, her dress pushed scandalously up her thighs and her hands tugging at the unbuttoned collar of his dress shirt, tie and jacket lost at some point, his stupid lovely mouth sucking hickies to the skin of her throat.

His curls are soft when she threads her fingers through his hair, and yanks him back.

“Shisui,” she gasps.

His eyes are very dilated in the dark of the ballroom. “Say that again,” he demands. “Promise you’ll say my name like that again.”

“You’re drunk,” Sakura tells him. “And I’m not-- We can’t-- I work at noon and you’re drunk and this--”

“Don’t tell me I don’t want this,” Shisui says. “Don’t tell me I don’t want you.”

Sakura’s eyes are wide and a little watery, and she wants to kiss him so much she’s shaking with it, but there are so many very good reasons for not kissing him.

“Don’t cry,” he says, and his hands are on her face, fingers sweeping along her cheekbones. “I hate it when you cry. You should only ever be happy. I want to make you happy.”

Sakura shakes her head gently, but he doesn’t let her go.

“Oh! I know! Itachi!”

Sakura jerks away, trying to spot Itachi, trying not to feel completely mortified.

Itachi freezes where he was trying to make a subtle get away.

“Itachi!” Shisui calls. “Get over here and tell Sakura that I’m in love with her.”

Sakura’s mouth falls open.

What.

Itachi squares his shoulders and lifts his chin, then walks calmly over to them.

Sakura tries to ignore the various Uchiha family members watching on.

This cannot be happening.

“Sakura,” Itachi greets her, and very politely does not remark on the face that Sakura’s lips are swollen or that Shisui is wearing half of her lipstick where he is pressed between her open thighs. “What’s this, Shisui?”

“Sakura thinks I’m only kissing her because I’m drunk and pity her,” Shisui declares.

“That’s because she’s a self-effacing person, and hasn’t had to put up with your melodramatic poetry recitations about the colour of her hair and her collarbones every time you get drunk for the last five years,” Itachi patiently explains.

Sakura blinks.

“What?” she demands.

Shisui looks her in the face, his face all composed joy. “I’m in love with you.”

Itachi nods. “He’s in love with you.”

“But,” Sakura grasps aimlessly. “He’s drunk?”

“Oh, undoubtedly. But he’ll still be in love with you in the morning.”

“It’s past midnight, so it is morning, and I’m still in love with you,” Shisui declares. “So you should let me kiss you and then take you to dinner.”

“I have a shift at noon,” Sakura reminds him, shell shocked. “It’s twelve hours. I won’t have time for dinner.”

“Hmm.” Shisui considers this information. “We’ll have to do breakfast, then.”

.

.

.

Sakura is wearing a pair of overpriced flip flops from the hotel gift shop, Ino’s dress, and Shisui’s suit jacket as she digs into a frankly ridiculous stack of pancakes.

“I can’t believe you’re making Itachi chaperone our first date,” Shisui moans.

His hand is warm on her thigh and he’s pressed closer than strictly necessary in the fairly spacious diner booth.

On the other side of the table, Itachi is drinking a cup of tea and doing a crossword puzzle. In pen. “I’m here to protect your virtue,” he explains absently.

Shisui pouts. “But I don’t want my virtue protected.”

“I’m not sleeping with you when you’re drunk,” Sakura tells him.

“Ah! But you are willing to sleep with me!” Shisui gestures triumphantly with his fork.

“We’ll see,” Sakura prevaricates, trying not to smile.

“I know,” he soothes, “you just don’t want to be interrupted by work. I understand. I want you to myself for at least twenty-four hours before I give you up, the first time. We’ll build up from there.”

“Oh?” Sakura asks.

Shisui nods enthusiastically. “I’m going to buy you so many comfortable shoes and dance with you every day and marry you so hard that it will echo back through time and convince you to put up with coming to Auntie Mikoto’s annual party until you fall in love with me and I marry you.”

Sakura laughs, and tries not to blush as Shisui watches her bared throat.

“Is that why I’ve come every year? Because you love me?”

“Yes,” Shisui tells her, wide smile and the remnants of her lipstick at the hinge of his jaw, tousled curls and unbuttoned dress shirt, “I love you.”

.

.

.

“What do you mean you aren’t free on a Friday night for almost two whole months?” Shisui wails dramatically. “When am I ever going to take you to dinner and make you fall in love with me? I make amazing dumplings, Sakura. There’s no way you’ll be able to resist my dumplings.”

Sakura darts up on her toes and presses a kiss to his chin. “Remember, you’ve got your love echoing through time on your side.”

“You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?” Shisui sighs, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her against his chest.

“Never,” Sakura agrees.

He sighs again, happily. “I love it when you’re mean.”

Sakura rocks them back and forth to the faint music tripping out to meet them on the sidewalk.

“Really?” Sakura asks, small, muffled against the fabric of his shirt.

Shisui tightens his grip on her. “I love you.”

And he spins her out, suddenly, his hands sure on hers as she twirls.

He catches her easily as she spins back in.

Sakura lets herself tumble into his arms.

“Let’s do breakfast,” she tells him. “But this time without the chaperone.”

“Oh?”

“As many breakfasts as you want.”

“A lifetime’s worth?

  
“Let’s start with Monday.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll convince you I mean it. I waited years without you, I can wait a few more years with you.”


End file.
